NEVERLAND
Page 2
“She’s a nobody.”
Despite having been in the same class for three quarters of the year, it appeared right up until the fight, I was just as invisible as I was on the first day. What a difference half an hour and a commotion could make.
The girls who wore too much makeup, who thrived on attention and who had Daddy’s money to spend, eyed me up and down, their derision clear. I didn’t fit in, I never had. Compared to most, I was poor, and for that reason I was invisible. I didn’t cake my face with expensive makeup and didn’t dress in season, which meant I wasn’t worth knowing. But when a boy two years older than me sticks his hand up my skirt causing a schoolyard fight, suddenly people wonder who I am and where I’ve come from.
I didn’t care about them. I cared about my best friend who was with the school nurse getting treated for his cuts and bruises and possibly a broken nose.
“Attention students,” a voice belonging to administration came over the loudspeaker, interrupting an annoyed Mrs. Garland who was on a roll discussing how fight or flight worked for warring soldiers. “Lucy Sommers to Principal Rosser’s office immediately. Thank you.”
Heads turned, eighteen pairs of eyes assessing my response. I could literally hear their nasty thoughts, their stares speaking volumes.
“Lucy, you’re going to have to see me at break to get the rest of the notes.” Unlike the others, my teacher’s eyes were kind. She knew trouble always found me. She knew my parents. She also knew that despite it all, I was her top student in History and was often on my case ensuring I wasn’t slipping.
“Yes, ma’am,” I agreed, unhooking my backpack from the chair and gathering my books and stationery, kindly provided by Mrs. Garland.
“Snitches get stitches,” a warning sounded from behind. Glancing over my shoulder, I saw Cameron’s stony expression. He was on the junior football team so there was a high chance he knew the eleventh grader.
Biting my lip to stop a retort that would only provoke matters, I weaved through the desks and whispers. Only when I entered the empty hall did I breathe a sigh of relief.
It didn’t last long.
The door to the admin office flew violently open as I reached for the brass knob. Caught off-guard, I stepped to the side as a disgruntled student barreled past, his ignorance to my presence evident when his shoulder collided with mine.
I winced with pain, but he didn’t stop. There was no apology. I was invisible.
Greeting Mrs. Seymore at reception, I sat down on the rickety wooden chair and waited my turn. Within moments, a fuming voice filled the small office. It came from Principal Rosser’s office. Clutching my backpack to my chest, my leg began a nervous bounce.
“Everything okay, honey?” Mrs. Seymore asked.
I met the concerned eyes and nodded. “Yes, I’m—”
“You know what’s a fucking joke?” A tall, tanned, muscly man with jet black, slicked back hair erupted through the door, smashing it against the wall, the glass panel dangerously vibrating in its frame. “The fucking joke is if you punish my boy and let that greaser get off scot-free.”
“Firstly…” Principal Rosser began with a calmness not many could master as well as he while placating the irate parent. “The name calling is unnecessary and not something we welcome in our multi-cultural school, and second, I won’t be discussing your son’s punishment with the other family just as I wouldn’t mention their son to you.”
Rosser’s eyes flicked to mine. He looked nervous. Why? The big man’s gaze followed. I shifted uncomfortably under his watchful stare and wondered why he made a point of lingering too long. Clearly, I wasn’t the only one who noticed.
Rosser cleared his throat. “Mr. Salvatore, I’ll be in touch at the end of the day once all involved have been spoken to.”
Salvatore scoffed. “Yeah, I’m not going to hold my breath. You’ve already fucking made your decision against my son.” Taking his leave, he swung the small wooden partition door with such force, it smashed into the reception desk causing everyone in the room to jump with fright. I stood to the side, holding my backpack close to my chest and getting as far away from the door as possible. Once more, I felt his unwanted attention, a shiver running up my spine. His tongue pressed to the back of his top teeth, making a ‘tsssssst’ sound, following it with a leer. A leer that shared an uncanny resemblance to the one which taunted me at recess.
“Miss Sommers,” Principal Rosser’s request broke the spell. “My office.” I followed him in and took a seat, nervously fidgeting with the bag strap’s metal buckle. I had a few reasons to be nervous. Firstly, being called into the principal’s office to discuss a schoolyard altercation was not something I wanted on my record. And secondly, Mr. Rosser was far too distracting. He was a handsome black man in his thirties, and the subject of many teenage girl crushes. The evidence was written with black markers all over the toilet doors and walls. And while I wasn’t one for following trends, especially by my female peers, I did agree with them on this occasion.
“Mr. Rosser, do you know how Romeo is? Is he okay?”
He glanced up while shuffling through some paperwork. “Mr. Sanchez is in a lot of trouble, Lucy.”
“He didn’t do anything wrong.”
“That’s not what witnesses say. They say he was very much an instigator.”
“Would you consider him an instigator because he was defending me? That boy stuck his hand up my skirt.”
“Two wrongs don’t make a right, Lucy. A girl as smart as you should know that.”
“Mr. Rosser, that boy wanted a fight—”
“And Mr. Sanchez gave him one,” he argued.
I hung my head knowing like most adults, they simply failed at understanding life in the schoolyard.
“Lucy,” he attempted, this time reading my mind. “I know you have every reason to think adults fail you. A good percentage in your life have. I’m not about failing you. Had you come and told me about the incident then we could have dealt with it. It didn’t need to escalate to the point which it did.”
“I understand that…” I paused because it was hard to explain. “Romeo sees more, that’s all.”
Principal Rosser leaned back in his chair and tapped his expensive pen on the open diary while contemplating his next question. “How’s things at home, Lucy?”
Biting my bottom lip, I drew blood. Rosser only knew the basics of what happened within the walls of my home. In order to keep Child Protection from prying, my parents had become expert storytellers so I was forced to compartmentalize the most disturbing details. With one exception—Romeo knew everything. And that’s why Principal Rosser would never understand why Romeo came to my defense even if he knew he’d lose against the older boy.
I managed a small smile and hoped it was convincing. “Improving,” I lied.
He returned my smile. A smile which said he didn’t for a second believe me.
Rosser leaned forward, interlacing his fingers. “Lucy, I’ve reviewed the CCTV in the quad where the altercation occurred, and unfortunately because you made contact with another student to cause physical harm, you too will have some form of consequence.
My jaw tensed so hard it hurt. These were the school rules no matter how much we all disagreed with them. Even the student defending him or herself was held accountable. But that wasn’t what I was concerned about. The consequence I faced in school would be nothing to what I’d receive at home if my father was sober enough to comprehend my actions.
“And you don’t have to worry,” he said, reading my mind once more. “I won’t be phoning home. You will, however, be expected to complete your punishment here at school.”
“I understand.” I stood to leave but his voice stopped me before I reached the door.
“And Lucy.”
“Yes?”
“Purely off the record, you’re my vote for the Stanton scholarship, so keep that record clean.”
I nodded, still tasting the metallic tang of blood in my mouth.
~~~
“You look like a panda,” I gently teased, spraying CleanAid onto the cloth. We sat at the large study table in the library, my job to clean the covers of all the books, working my way through the endless shelves.
“Do I look like Josie Walner when she’s in Goth mode?”
“It definitely looks like you borrowed her makeup.”
Sitting across from me, Romeo gave his lopsided smile. His punishment was to rip out the old record tabs on the inside of each book and glue in another before handing it over to me for cleaning. Despite Rosser going easy on us, Romeo was lagging. “I’m truly unsure which one I prefer.”
“Pandas are cute. I’d go with that.”
Stilling the glue stick, he looked up through his lashes, a coy grin twitching his lips. “Are you calling me cute?”
I scoffed at his attempt to fish for more compliments, and as always with Romeo, I took the bait. “You know you’re cute, you don’t need me to tell you that. Even with your two black eyes and swollen nose.”
“I knew you couldn’t resist me. All these times you’ve been lying to yourself.”
Throwing the cleaning cloth at his face, I laughed at his lame joke. “Shut up and glue.” With his smile lingering, we fell into a comfortable silence and I watched as Romeo finally got stuck into his task. “I just wanted to thank you,” I said at last.
“For?” he asked without breaking his stride.
“For coming to my defense, yesterday. For sticking up for me.”
His now solemn eyes met mine. “You fight enough battles on your own. Sometimes life needs to cut you some slack. And by slack, that means your Mexican friend coming to your rescue.” Sinaloa-born, Romeo Sanchez was the son of two Mexican migrants, who in my mind were the most awesome parents a child could ask for. They met when they worked at the same restaurant, he as a bell-hop, she as a server. It was called Romeo’s, hence why they named their son after a place which brought them love.
“Even at the expense of looking like a panda?”
He tossed another book onto the pile. “As long as you’ll always say I’m cute, I’ll happily look like this every day.”
“Get a fucking room, you two. You’re making me sick.”
Caught off guard, we both jumped at the familiar sound of the older boy’s voice.
“What are you doing here?” In a heartbeat, Romeo was on his feet obstructing the aisle and effectively blocking me. Not even the memory and the physical pain of yesterday would stop him from coming to my rescue.
“Completing my punishment, same as you.”
Romeo scoffed. “They put you in the library with us?”
The older boy seemed bored with the conversation, eyes moving over his surroundings like he’d never seen them before. “Looks like it.” Tilting to the left, he looked around Romeo and waved, following it up with a sly wink. “Hi, Lucy.”
My skin crawled. How did he know my name? I didn’t even know his.
This provocation only reignited Romeo’s rage.
“You’ll stay the hell away from her.”
He sneered. “I’ll try. No promises.”
With full body weight behind it, Romeo shoved the boy’s chest, knocking him into the study tables behind. Although he didn’t expect it, the boy seemed unfazed and laughed with ridicule.
“Settle down, lover boy,” he mocked, straightening himself. In a heartbeat his expression turned serious. “Or I’ll be forced to give you another serving, and this time I won’t stop because a teacher comes to your rescue.”
“Why don’t you crawl back under the rock you came from?”
“Why don’t you crawl back to Mexico, Taco Bell.”
“I was fucking born here, you racist asshole.”
“Sshh!” came the hiss of the librarian from the front of the room. She looked within seconds of reporting us, her hand poised over the desk phone.
“Romeo, let’s just leave. We’ll ask Principal Rosser to put us somewhere else.”
“I wouldn’t bother,” came the boy’s indifferent tone. “They want us to complete our punishment after school and the only place still staffed is right here. So…” his greedy eyes met mine, “… I guess you’re stuck with me.”
“Just keep your hands to yourself,” I said firmly, hiding my trembling hands under the table.
He smiled. “Like I said, I’ll try but no promises.”
“You’re such a dick.” Romeo went to move back to his seat but took two hasty steps back. “What the fuck, man?”
I saw it too, the glimmer of metal. The eleventh grader laughed at our seemingly naïve reactions, throwing his head back and defying the librarians continual hiss to be quiet. “Relax,” he said. “It’s just a paint scraper.” He’d purposefully held it on an angle to make it look like a knife. He gestured to the pile of books on the table beside me. “While you soft cocks keep your hands clean, I get to scrape gum off tables. I guess it takes someone with real muscle to do this.”
“Yeah,” Romeo said with sarcasm. “That’s definitely why Rosser gave you that job.”
I hid my giggle and returned to my chair where I started working on the pile of books Romeo had already glued. Within a few moments, he rejoined, eyes trained on the moron behind me.
“Let it go,” I said, fearful of another altercation. “He won’t try anything in the library.”
His doubtful eyes appealed to mine. “You’re giving him too much credit.”
“I don’t give him anything. I just don’t want to see anyone get hurt.”
Deciding to let it go, we fell into completing our tasks in silence, keen to see the end of our punishment. The only noise came from the intermittent scraping from under the tables.
Only fifteen minutes later, the paint scraper flew across our table, the metal and wood clanging on impact. In the commotion, the spray bottle slipped from my grasp and landed on the floor.
In a blaze of fury, Romeo was out of his chair. “What the fuck is your problem?”
The boy grinned. “Settle down. If I wanna get out of here, I have to scrape the bottom of your table. Now I don’t mind if she stays, but I don’t particularly wanna see what’s between your legs.”
This time, it was me who shot up from my chair, hands against Romeo’s chest stopping him from jumping the table. “Stop. It’s not worth it.”
“Yeah, chico,” the boy mocked. “It’s not worth me messing up any more of that pretty face of yours. But I will if you keep coming at me.”
I turned my attention to the boy. “Why don’t you just leave us alone? Why are you harassing us?”
He considered me a moment, and then using his index finger, gestured for me to come closer. Reluctantly giving him an inch, he closed the rest of the space, his mouth brushing against my ear. “It’s not what you’ve done. It’s what you haven’t done to me. Or more to the point, what I haven’t done to you.”
I pulled away, disgusted, feeling rage bubble from within.
“But we can fix that now, if you want?”
My hand acted on its own accord, slapping him across his smug face. He barely recoiled but touched his fingers to his mouth, a faint reddish tinge coloring his bottom teeth.
Looking through his lashes, eyes narrowed and filled with challenge, he leaned in close so only I could hear. “You’ll pay for that…” he ran his tongue over his lip, “… I can promise you, and as you’ll soon find out, I always keep my promises.”
I stepped back, squaring my shoulders. He would be a fool to think I wouldn’t fight back. I’d been fighting my whole life with bigger, stronger men. He was nothing in the scheme of things, even if I was a younger girl and half his size.
The older boy looked from me to Romeo, his thoughts unclear, but his tone was certain.
“I’ll see you both around. Sooner than you think.”
The sun was starting to set by the time we left the library, a soft warm glow coating everything around us. I wasn’t in a hurry to go home. I never was.
“Come for dinner,” Romeo said, hooking his backpack over his shoulders.
I smiled at my best friend who knew going home was often a struggle for survival. “Thanks, but I should get home and check on Mom. Make sure she’s okay.”
We took the stairs that led to the front of the school and passed the now deserted main administration. “When is she going to leave him?” Romeo asked, unable to hide his disdain for my mother’s life choices.
“I guess when she realizes one day she may not survive his next assault. So far, she seems immune to it, almost like she no longer feels or wants to feel.”
“Look out!” Romeo wrapped his body protectively around mine and pushed me to the side. The screech of tires drowned out my scream. When I opened my eyes, I saw just how close we’d come to being hit, and realized how near Romeo had come to bearing the impact of the Mustang that hurled toward us.
“Are you okay?” he breathed urgently against my cheek, his hands gripping my shoulders.
“Yes,” I confirmed before he turned his attention to the five boys unloading from the car. They were all bigger. Stronger.
“What the fuck is wrong with you? You almost hit us.”
“If I wanted to hit you, I would have,” came a familiar voice as he broke through the line of friends. He pointed to Romeo’s bruised face. “That much is obvious.”
Romeo’s nostrils flared. “So, what do you want?”
“Why don’t you head on home to your mami and papi and leave Lucy here with us? We promise to show her a good time.”
Romeo reached behind, wrapping my hand in his.
“Why don’t you go fuck yourself.” He turned to me and for the first time in dealing with the eleventh grader, I saw a real fear. He didn’t care about himself. He cared what they might do to me. “We need to leave, now!” Romeo said with a quiet urgency. He led me in the direction of home, me having to run to keep pace. We were still set a ways back from the main street and out of view from passersby if we needed help, and something told me we’d need all the help we could get.